The Land Of Bondage, Its Ancient Monuments - Being The Journal Of A Tour In Egypt (1851) (Paperback)

General Books publication date: 2009 Original publication date: 1852 Original Publisher: D. Appleton Subjects: Egypt History / Africa / General History / Ancient / Egypt History / Middle East / Egypt Juvenile Nonfiction / History / Middle East Travel / Middle East / Egypt Notes: This is a black and white OCR reprint of the original. It has no illustrations and there may be typos or missing text. When you buy the General Books edition of this book you get free trial access to Million-Books.com where you can select from more than a million books for free. Excerpt: SHIFTLESS ARABS. -- RAISING WATER 91 So I set myself about it, and starched and ironed to show him how, and for a first attempt I flattered myself that I got through pretty well. The Arabs are a shiftless set. In almost every thing that they undertake we can show them a better way, which they acknowledge at the moment; but when they are to do the same thing again they go to work in their old fashion, so that there is little satisfaction in teaching them. For all the little changes and fixtures that I needed in my cabin, I had to use the saw, the hammer and the chisel, myself; for I had no patience to stand by and see the dragoman's clumsy attempts. A little before twelve o'clock we came in sight of Benihassan, and saw, in the lofty rocks, the excavations which we are to visit on our return, as they are said to be very interesting, and even more ancient than the tombs at Thebes. On the opposite bank of the river we saw the people raising water by hand for irrigating the land. It is simple enough, but must be somewhat laborious. A little hollow, shaped like a well, is dug in the bank, on a level with the river. Into this descends a bowl-shaped bucket, made of skin, and this is attached to a pole secured by a pivot into an upright forked post, like a common New England country well of the old time. The water is thus raised to a reservoir above, from which another bucket carries it to a third, until...